The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1887-07-16
sAu1PETER CAVE.
Which Furnished Nitro for Confeder
ate Gunpowder.

WltnlIl uIilc VI I"O VI CHSi
mans route to Atlanta there is, in
Barlow county, Georgia, cavern OF
considerable historic interest. We
first hear Of it in 1885, when a
handful of Cherokee Indians, who
had incurred the displeasure of a
band of highwaymen known as
"The Pony Club" found refuge in
the cave until they were rescued by
some regulators. In those days
the walls and roofs of the passages
were white, and their stalactites RI
vailed in beauty the icycles which
formed about the mountain cas-
cades; but since the workmen, in
getting out saltpeter for the gun
powder of the Confederate army,
built great fires of pitch pine, and
filled the cave with smoke, those
dark passages and gloomy cham
bers, with their sooty walls, give
one the impression that he is ap-
preaching Vulcan's forge, and the
black stalactites in all their fam
tastic shapes seem to be the handi-
work of that great artisan. Though
these objects do not resemble thun-
derbolts, some of them have been
knocked off and made into bolts
no less destructive. Oflate Vulcan
seems to have abandoned the place
to Pluto, who made his presence
known last year by tearing up the
floor and breaking pillar in the
lowest chamber. There was no
other creature in the cave but
winged beast, which loved darkness
rather than light, and must have
been one of Pluto's little angels.
The approach to the entrance is
by a lonely road between wild hills,
whose aspect is so cheerless, and
the signing of the wind in their
thickets so mOurnful, that a man
almost believes he is going to an
awful doom. After going up the
hill for a hundred yards one IS
suddenly confronted by an opening
ten feet square, and, had a skull
and cross-bones been placed above
it, he could not look into that dark
and broadening abyss with darker
and more Internal passages, with
out feeling cold horror at the
thought Of exploring hades.
With good rejecting lamp we
descended a rough incline at an
angle Of forty-five degrees until we
were seventy-fve feet below the
opening. The roof was not so
much inclined, and the mouth
widened to sixty feet at the bottom,
so as to form a large chambr Be-
yond this the floor was smooth and
the roof only twelve feet high. At
this place picnicers have often
danced, and it is known as the
BALL Room" From there we
passed through several large rooms,
one of which was nearly 100 feet
wide, with a roof fifty feet high in
one place. The floor was strewn
with rock fragments, and in pass
ing out we had to climb around
rough powders. After ascending a
steep, slippery place for about fifty
feet we were confronted by an inn
mense stalagmite in the shape of a
cone, eight feet in diameter at the
base and twelve feet high. Above
it cluster of stalactites resembled
a chandelier. On the right and left
were openings into small chamber
behind the cone. Returning thence
we went up the main passage at an
angle of forty-five degrees and came
to a circular group of stone icicles
six to eight feet long. They re-
minded me of the illustration of
the Saracen's Tent" Of Luray
cave, and one of them by itself
formed a horses leg with knee and
thigh almost perfect. Passing sew
eral pillars and a smaller cone we
descended by steps cut in the rock
to a chamber with vaulted roof and
level floor. Directly over the en-
trance was a hole twenty inches in
diameter and about six feet deep.
From this place a very low arch
twenty feet wide let us into pass
age connecting with the main en-
trance. Returning to the big cone
we passed through large room
full of rock fragments into a cham
ber, from which we ascended by a
fifteen-fOOt ladder to a small hole
large enough to crawl through.
From it we emerged into n long
passage at the end of which day.
light appeared. Fifty yards farther
| in that direction was the jug
formed by a stalagmite three feet
thick and six feet high, with neck
formed by a pendent from the roof
, The handle had been formed in the
same way and was afterwards
: broken off by some explorer. Al
the foot of the jug was a small
!, spring of clear, cold water, which
was very refreshing after two hours
of hard climbing. A few yards
further we ascended sixty feet by
an incline and came out of the
, small entrance. The air above
ground seemed very oppressive, and
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